Start your week off with these 10 Big Ten links

By Tom Dienhart, BTN.com Senior Writer, 3 years ago

Start your week off with these 10 Big Ten links

By Tom Dienhart, BTN.com Senior Writer, 3 years ago

Wisconsin’s season ended one game short of the national title game. The loss to Kentucky on Saturday was close, painful and soon won’t be forgotten in Madison. Still, as Jeff Potrykus of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel points out, there are many good memories from one of the best seasons in school annals.

UW won 30 of 38 games in Bo Ryan’s 13th season as head coach. The Badgers did not win a Big Ten title. But they won their first 16 games, the best start in program history, and climbed to No. 3 in the national polls. They reached the Final Four — the only Big Ten team to do so this season — for the first time since 2000.

Marcus Fuller of the St. Paul Pioneer Press points out that after winning the NIT in 1993, the Gophers advanced to the second round of the NCAA tournament in 1994. They won the NIT again in 1998, then lost in the first round of the 1999 NCAA tournament. Only four of the past seven NIT champions have been able to qualify for the NCAA tournament the following season, so there are no guarantees.

But three of the past four NIT winners reached the NCAA’s Sweet 16 this season: Baylor, Dayton and Stanford. The only NIT winner since 2010 not to reach the Sweet 16 was 2011 champion Wichita State, which was 35-0 until a third-round NCAA tournament loss to Kentucky.

In 2014-15, the Gophers will have four seniors (DeAndre Mathieu, Andre Hollins, Mo Walker and Elliott Eliason) and a junior (Joey King) among their top six players. Not bad, huh?

BTN.com senior writer Tom Dienhart is a veteran sports journalist who covers Big Ten football and men’s basketball for BTN.com and BTN TV. Find him on Twitter and Facebook, read all of his work at btn.com/tomdienhart, and subscribe to his posts via RSS. Also, send questions to his weekly mailbag using the form below and read all of his previous answers in his reader mailbag section.

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